Author: Anna Sundin

The JPIAMR, in partnership with 8 European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and the UK), and Canada, is launching a fourth joint call for working group proposals.  The call sets out to assemble motivated groups of leading experts and establish Working Groups in order to enhance resource alignment and maximise existing and future efforts to combat AMR by pushing forward the conceptualisation of ideas, in turn providing white papers, prospective views, guidelines and/or best practice/ roadmap/systematic reviews and frameworks of value to the wider research community. Based on the priority topics identified in the JPIAMR Strategic Research Agenda, applicants are invited to tackle one or more of the suggested focal areas. However, the following examples are neither mandatory nor limiting. Working Groups should be assembled with emphasis on what is needed at a National and International level to address AMR.

DEADLINE:  The proposal submission deadline is June 6th, 2016 (17:00, CET).

More information and how to submit your application

IMI2 Prelaunch Flyer

The Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) will soon launch its 9^th Call for proposals under IMI 2.

The Call will include the topic:

• Addressing the clinical burden of Clostridium difficile infection (CDI): evaluation of the burden, current practices and set up of a European research platform (part of the IMI New Drugs for Bad Bugs (ND4BB) programme) 

Find out more

The Call indicative topics texts can be found on the respective web page: http://bit.ly/futuretopics.

Webinars

From 11 to 29 April 2016, IMI will hold information webinars on each of the Call topics as well as on IMI rules and procedures. Webinar registration is open via http://bit.ly/1RSPiTC.

 

The Conference will review what needs to be done to achieve a more prudent and appropriate use of antibiotics in the European Union (EU), with an emphasis on human use. It will bring together experts and policy makers on antimicrobial resistance.

Read more

The development of new antibiotics is a major aspect strongly associated to AMR. In a two days symposium international experts communicate state-of-the-art science from the definition of the problem.

Read more

 

 

The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation has launched a call for ‘Novel Approaches to Characterizing and Tracking the Global Burden of Antimicrobial Resistance’.

The goal is to identify approaches that provide more robust and reliable evidence regarding the global scale, impact, and/or transmission dynamics of AMR, specifically as applicable to low- and middle-income settings. The call also seeks solutions that will provide an assessment of various drivers and the health impact of interventions on rates of resistance.

Because AMR is a complex problem with multiple interconnected drivers and our focus is on high mortality and data-poor geographies, these approaches will likely require new data streams and approaches (e.g. modeling) applied in a sufficiently robust way to lead to strategic guidance for decision-makers.

The call is soliciting innovative ideas for models, tools, analytics, surveillance platforms, technologies, and other high impact approaches to generating evidence about the burden and impact of antimicrobial resistance in low and middle income settings, and improving its translation into practice. In particular, transformative and innovative approaches which identify and fill knowledge and practice gaps currently limiting progress in AMR surveillance and epidemiology are of interest.

Read more about the call.

The European Parliament could play a crucial role in shaping a European prudent use of antibiotics policy and JPIAMR can provide evidence and data to support such a policy. JPIAMR should also provide best practice guidelines. This was the main message from a meeting JPIAMR organised on 16 February 2016 with European Parliamentarians to discuss how the initiative can take an active part in the implementation of the EP resolution on ‘Safer healthcare in Europe: improving patient safety and fighting antimicrobial resistance’.

The aim of this informal meeting was to gather a smaller number of individuals to engage in concrete discussions on how the JPIAMR can really take on an active role in implementing the resolution on Safer Healthcare in Europe and other initiatives such as the European Action Plan. We need to make sure that all these good initiatives from research to policy making work together and move from words to implementation. Antimicrobial resistance is a real threat to society and there is not one solution to the problem. JPIAMR is already acting on a number of the issues addressed in the resolution but we would like to do more.

The meeting addressed the threat of antibiotic resistance, future legislation on prudent use of antibiotics and prescription behaviour of antibiotics, with several MEPs. Another topic on the agenda was how research can provide evidence for future political action in the field. For example, research can provide data and evidence on death rates or transmission of resitance through food. Also it is key to involve the agriculture sector.

This article was published in the Parliament Magazine February issue 2016.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has led to a global increase in morbidity and mortality due to resistant bacterial infections.

Bacteria develop resistance naturally. It is hence not enough to only develop new antibiotics as the bacteria, through the process of selective pressure, will always find ways of becoming resistant. Therefore, to tackle the problem, we must instead focus on reducing morbidity and mortality rates of bacterial infectious disease. We must also carry out more research to better understand how resistance develops and spreads in the environment. To reduce this threat, we should develop improved diagnostics, data-driven, evidence-based and mandatory stewardship, better surveillance methods and smarter strategies and trials design. Changing how we use antibiotics in health care and agriculture should also be a key area for improvement.

The Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance, JPIAMR, coordinates national funding and supports collaborative action to fill knowledge gaps in this field. By mobilising existing and new resources the initiative can create a greater critical mass and attract new researchers into the AMR field. A Strategic Research Agenda (SRA), which outlines key [neglected] areas to tackle, guides JPIAMR and focuses research actions. The SRA also serves as a guidance documents for nations to align their AMR research agenda.

As resistant bacteria know no national borders, JPIAMR works at an international scale. By engaging individual nations beyond Europe as members (22 current members), the JPIAMR platform enables collaborative actions in areas of unmet needs. For example, in January 2016, JPIAMR co-organised a workshop with the US National Institute of Health (NIH) and the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which brought together scientists in the field of antibacterial resistance. The aim was to increase the trans-Atlantic dialogue and encourage scientific collaboration to enhance research addressing antibacterial resistance.

JPIAMR key activities

International collaboration with

• World Health Organisation (WHO) Global Research Agenda
• Transatlantic US-EU Task Force on AMR (TATFAR)
• G7 on the AMR Declaration
• Joint Industry Group EC-JPI-IMI-EPFIA

Calls for Proposals

• Yearly Calls
• Open Call: First Call (3rd JPIAMR call) for proposals in the field of AMR transmission dynamics

Scoping workshops to map gaps and future actions needed

• Diagnostics
• Research infrastructures
• Transmission dynamics

Mapping exercises of the funding landscape to identify gaps

• European AMR research mapping database available online

JPIAMR cannot address all aspects of the AMR problem, but can pave a way forward by producing new research, engaging new researchers and creating networks that create long-term momentum for other areas in society. There is an urgent need for interdisciplinary and public-private partnerships to support research in the antimicrobial resistance field. Exchanges between industry, public health bodies, and academic bodies will entail benefits not only from a cost-sharing perspective, but also for coordination of the respective research activities. This is where JPIAMR will make a difference.

If you are interested to know more about the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance, do not hesitate to contact us at secretariat.jpiamr@vr.se

Article in Parliament Magazine

The Dutch presidency has told Europe’s ministers of health and agriculture they must work together if antimicrobial resistance is to be tackled reports Research Professional.

Europe’s governments must set aside worries about subsidiarity and make tackling antimicrobial resistance a common priority, Edith Schippers, the Dutch minister of health, welfare and sport, told delegates at a Ministerial Conference on Antibiotic Resistance.

Speaking at the presidency-organised conference on 9-10 February, Schippers said that, although she shared concerns about subsidiarity in the EU, “antimicrobial resistance is a cross-border health threat, whether we like it or not”.

The conference brought together health and agriculture ministers and emphasised tackling antimicrobial resistance according to a “one-health” approach by drawing on a mix of disciplines including human and animal health, the environment and agriculture.

In her speech, Schippers said that there was room for greater cooperation on antimicrobial resistance under existing EU regulations, but that political will was needed to develop new antibiotics and diagnostic methods.

She said that antimicrobial resistance and the use of antibiotics are still rising despite the existence of a European action plan for tackling resistance, and called on ministers not to look back in 10 years’ time having failed to reverse this trend.

The ministers were also addressed by Margaret Chan, director general of the World Health Organization, and by Vytenis Andriukaitis, the European commissioner for health and food safety.

On 9 February, the Community for Open Antimicrobial Drug Discovery, an initiative from the Wellcome Trust and Australia’s Institute for Molecular Bioscience and the University of Queensland that screens existing compounds for antimicrobial activity, announced an agreement with the EU Innovative Medicines Initiative’s €85-million Enable project to help candidate antimicrobials progress into clinical trials.

Note: This article is copied from Research Professional

On 20-21 January 2016, the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance (JPIAMR), the US National Institute of Health (NIH) and the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), organised a meeting which brought together scientists in the field of antibacterial resistance. The aim was to increase the trans-Atlantic dialogue and encourage scientific collaboration to enhance research addressing antibacterial resistance.

With antibacterial resistance accelerating at an alarming pace, leading to a global increase in morbidity and mortality due to resistant bacterial infections, it was crucial to take the first step towards greater collaboration globally. The talks and discussions during the two days covered cutting-edge approaches to address antibacterial resistance.

“Our goal is not to fight antibiotic resistance but morbidity and mortality of bacterial infectious disease. And to do so, you need an entire tool kit. We need to control infections, not resistance,” said Fernando Baquero, Ramón y Cajal University Hospital, Spain.

Much discussion around continuous treatment of infectious diseases, when our current antibiotics fail, have centred around the development of new antibiotics. “We cannot get out of this problem by only developing new antibiotics. The selective pressure will always find ways of becoming resistant. How do we mitigate this relationship?” asked Henry F. Chambers, University of California. He went on to say that we must meet the challenge of resistance with improved diagnostics, stewardship which is data driven, evidence-based and mandatory, smarter strategies and trial design and finally “some new AB wouldn’t hurt either.” “When new drugs emerge we need a plan to reduce the emergence of resistance,” added George Drusano, University of Florida.

The use of antibiotics is one of the risk factors in the emergence of resistance. But it’s important to be aware that emergence and spread of resistance is different. Emergence comes from usage of antibiotics. For example frequently prescribing a certain type of antibiotic against a certain type of infection will select for resistance. The spread of resistance is different. Resistance can spread from the hospital to the community and then into the environment as well as from animals into the enviroment. That’s the cycle of spread.

We have been using antibiotics for a long time and it has been used as cheap infrastructure. It’s cheaper to prescribe antibiotics than a vaccine. And it’s cheaper to dose our agricultural animals with antibiotics than for example to provide better housing allowing more space which would also keep them healthier without antibiotics.

But how do we turn the tide? What are the alternatives? Researchers are working on alternative therapies such as Ecobiotic drugs. This is a new technology for the treatment of disease where the microbiome (the natural bacteria in our bodies) is being replenished to better withstand invading bacteria.

“We have to invest more money into research to better understand the problem of resistance from all angles. This is what the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance (JPIAMR) is doing. We have recently opened a call for proposals in the field of transmission dynamics as we are dedicated to the one health approach,” said Laura Marin, coordinator of the initiative.

Read about the call. 

On 22 Januray 2016, the Joint Programming Initiative on Antimicrobial Resistance (JPIAMR) co-organised a trans-Atlantic workshop discussing clinical trial networks in the field of antimicrobial resistance together with the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), the US National Institute of Health (NIH), the European Commission and COMBACTE. This meeting was the first of its kind.

“The meeting generated very fruitful conversations with represenatives of industry, regulatory agents and principal investigators running clinical trials,” said Laura Marin, coordinator of JPIAMR.

The workhop was preceeded on 20-21 January by the meeting ‘New Frontiers in Antibacterial Resistance Research’ which brought together scientists in the field of antibacterial resistance. The aim was to increase the trans-Atlantic dialogue and encourage scientific collaboration to enhance research addressing antibacterial resistance.

“The first step was to share experiences and increase collaboration. That was the purpose of these two days [20-21 January],” said Dennis Dixon, NIH/NIAID.

The Clinical Trial Workshop Objectives:

• to share information on current existing initiatives for clinical trial networks for antimicrobial resistance, in order to learn from each other and avoid duplication of efforts;
•  to discuss challenges and opportunities to overcome barriers for the efficient conduct of high-quality global clinical trials;
• to foster opportunities for collaboration between the different networks and initiatives in the EU, US, and CA to facilitate clinical research in our fight against AMR;
• to work towards solutions and recommendations to overcome the barriers identified through better alignment of existing networks and resources.